Man accused of having a machine gun at Tuskegee University during a hail of gunfire that left one man dead and at least 16 others wounded told a federal agent that he fired his gun during the shooting, but denied pointing it at anyone.

The new details are contained in a newly unsealed federal complaint that describes how an officer ran to the scene of the shooting. That officer found a body and then saw Jaquez Myrick with a Glock pistol, the complaint states.

Myrick was later questioned by state and federal agents, who asked him if he fired his firearm during the shooting.

“Myrick later confessed to firing the Glock but denied shooting anyone,” a special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, who participated in the interview, wrote in the complaint.

Myrick, 25, of Montgomery, is accused of having a weapon with a machine gun conversion device and faces a federal charge of possession of a machine gun. The complaint does not accuse him of shooting anyone. Federal court documents do not list an attorney who can speak on Myrick’s behalf, and it is unclear from jail records whether he has one.

The complaint also details the chaotic scene and how Myrick was taken into custody.

A Tuskegee police officer, one of the first to respond to reports of campus shootingHe heard the gunshots immediately, but was unable to drive his patrol car through a parking lot because it was too crowded with people and cars, according to court records.

Officer Alan Ashley then got out of his car and ran to the scene of the shooting, soon finding a man dead from a gunshot wound, according to the complaint. Ashley then saw Myrick, armed with a Glock pistol, and detained him, according to the complaint.

The city officer also handed the gun to the special agent who wrote the complaint.

“During a field examination, I found that the pistol functioned as a machine gun,” the federal agent wrote.

Myrick told officers he had come from his home in Montgomery to the Tuskegee campus “looking for a party” and was with some friends when the shooting began.

He said he bought the Glock at a pawn shop in Tampa, Florida, and then bought a machine gun conversion device from a seller he met through the online site Discord, the complaint states. Myrick said he had the package delivered to a vacant residence and installed the device on his gun.

The shooting occurred as the 100th week home from school was coming to an end. A dozen of the victims were hit by gunfire and the others were wounded as they tried to escape the chaotic scene, authorities said. Many of the injured were students.

The man killed was identified as La’Tavion Johnson, 18, of Troy, Alabama, who was not a student, the local coroner said.

The FBI joined the investigation and said it was seeking tips from the public, as well as any video witnesses might have. He created an online site for people to upload videos.

The shooting is the latest case in which a “machine gun conversion device” was found, something law enforcement officials across the country have expressed serious concerns about. The proliferation of this type of weapons is possible thanks to small pieces of metal or plastic manufactured with a 3D printer or ordered online.

Guns with conversion devices have been used in several mass shootings, including one that left four dead in a sweet sixteen party in Alabama last year and another that left six dead in a Bar district in Sacramento, California.

“It takes two or three seconds to attach some of these devices to a firearm to instantly turn that weapon into a machine gun,” said Steve Dettelbach, director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, in AP report on guns. earlier this year.

The shooting shocked the entire university community, said Amare’ Hardee, a senior from Tallahassee, Florida, who is president of the student government association.

“This senseless act of violence has affected us all, whether directly or indirectly,” he said at the school’s welcome convocation on Sunday morning.

Sunday’s shooting comes a little more than a year after four people were injured in a shooting at a Tuskegee University student housing complex. Two campus visitors were shot and two students were injured while trying to leave the scene of what campus officials described as an “unsanctioned party” in September 2023, police reported. Montgomery Advertiser reported.

About 3,000 students are enrolled at the university about 40 miles (64 kilometers) east of Montgomery, Alabama’s capital.

The college was the first historically black college to be designated a National Registered Landmark in 1966. It was also designated a National Historic Site in 1974, according to the school’s website.

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